The recent bill abolishing draft notices is extremely dangerous because, among other things,
it causes a significant delusion in people's minds, which can cost them their lives.
A no-show at the enlistment office will deal you a harsh blow.
According to the new bill, you may be deprived of your rights and even face criminal charges.
In this scenario, some will be tempted to think they shouldn't dodge the problem, but try to solve it.
Show up at the enlistment office, face the evaluation board, show them the documents, and officially get their way.
Or just go on a “tour of duty,” if nothing else helps.
The consequences of dodging are clearly unpleasant,
while the risks of visiting the military enlistment office may be underestimated.
It's hard to accept that nobody cares about you.
No one is concerned about your life, and no one will be held accountable for your death.
You'll simply be replaced with someone else who will likely be killed just as quickly.
This idea is almost impossible to grasp for someone born and raised in today's world where life is the top priority,
safety is everything, and any death is a big deal that implies severe consequences.
No matter how many videos I create or how many you watch, the authorities' lack of accountability doesn't fit even
in our minds.
That's why, even now, when the state is clearly gearing up to send masses of people to the frontlines,
blocking any escape routes, many people continue to act as if nothing was happening.
Today, we're discussing this delusion.
The war isn't just about blood, horror, and atrocities — it also serves as a gateway to a completely different world,
one we haven't experienced or known.
This world is difficult to imagine, but today, we'll give it a shot.
I rarely ask you to share a video, but this one is an exception.
Half of my viewers are from Russia, and they're surprised how their fellow citizens’ — including those
who have proven to be otherwise quite reasonable — react to the new draft law.
It's crucial for people to grasp what's happening to our minds right now and why we struggle to come to grips with the reality.
The more people understand this, the more lives can be saved.
RECRUITS’ LACK OF JUDGMENT
For me to better explain what I mean, let's first go back to last fall, to the first mobilization drive.
It's common to mock the people recruited during that fall campaign.
Grown men with college degrees, families, kids, jobs, and no mental issues obediently pile into buses.
They are having fun, knocking back beers, and messing around as if they were
a bunch of grad students on their way to a frat party.
But we're well aware that the gathering they’re about to attend isn’t a frat party or a barbecue.
Their destination is doom.
These are not elementary school kids, but mature adults with real lives and numerous responsibilities to their loved ones.
How could they not get this? How could they be marching so merrily to their demise?
In reality, it’s no laughing matter.
Even my viewers, who understand a great deal about this war, could fall into the same trap.
The train of thought of those recruits is easy to trace back.
Things cannot be that terrible, right? How could the state summon civilians and drive them to their deaths?
Of course, we'll spend some time running around and shooting at a training camp, and then, in the worst-case scenario,
we'll be guarding a canned food warehouse somewhere in the south of Russia.
The state must understand, the recruit reasons, that I'm 50 years old, have a belly the size of a jumbo watermelon,
and flaunt a long medical history.
The last time I practiced target shooting Zelenskyy was a sixth-grader.
The state can't seriously consider me fit for combat action. It must realize that I wouldn't last a week there.
What kind of a GI would I make?
Worst-case scenario, they'll send me to load crates on the homefront, and I may even get paid for the gig.
After all, if I get killed on the battlefield, the bastard in charge will undoubtedly face punishment.
It's clear this will be a crime. No one will ever do that, for sure.
It's next to impossible to imagine that the state would send you an official document
and process paperwork with the sole intent to kill you.
The government assumes responsibility for your life.
There are officials who will be fired and jailed if someone dies on their watch.
That's how modern states operate.
If a government wants something from a person, if it requires them to show up somewhere and takes them away,
it commits to ensuring their well-being.
The death of any individual within the authorities' purview is considered a disaster.
RED TAPE AT MY SERVICE
We live in a state based on red tape and written rules.
These rules might not be followed, could be violated, or contradict each other, but they do exist.
You can always cite these rules.
They emphasize that a person's life and health are of utmost value.
Someone must always be accountable for your well-being.
In this system, it's inconceivable that it’ll go unnoticed if someone dies or gets injured.
True, there isn't an independent judicial system in Russia to safeguard these rules.
However, there exists a large number of law enforcement and regulatory bureaucratic agencies constantly competing
with each other, and they’d be more than eager to scrutinize both those they oversee and one another.
Their jobs and careers depend on this. Regardless of where it is that you've been mistreated, had your rights violated,
or faced threats to your life, there will always be people that will be more than happy to address your complaint.
Not because they genuinely care about your rights, but because paperwork, inspections, identified violations,
and active investigations are what they thrive on.
That's why in the state we've grown used to,
there can be no scenario where someone is shipped to their deaths or even to their injuries.
Young people may not know this, but back in the late 1990s, every Russian school housed a workshop.
A real workshop equipped with a wide range of genuine machines from drills to lathes.
Manual labor classes were conducted daily in these workshops for students in 5th grade and above.
Then, starting from the early 2000s, workshops began to vanish.
It wasn't a top-down decision made by the Ministry of Education or anything like that. Instead, local education authorities,
or sometimes even school principals, would lock the workshop doors and forget about them.
Why? Because if hundreds of children in your school interact with industrial equipment every week,
it's inevitable that at some point, a kid will suffer an injury, a broken finger if nothing else.
They'll end up in an emergency room, and you as the principal will have to explain occupational safety
and security measures to the prosecutor's office.
Best-case scenario, all kinds of supervisory agencies will be visiting you for months to identify and document violations.
Worst case, you face criminal charges.
An injured kid, regardless of the circumstances and even if it's entirely their fault, constitutes an emergency for any school
or education board.
It puts the entire system on high alert, leads to discussions at meetings, requires countless explanations and testimonies,
and may result in blown KPIs, firings, or even jail time in extreme cases.
The child will have their cast removed and soon forget how they once recklessly stuck their finger into a lathe.
However, the entire adult hierarchy responsible for their safety will remember the incident for the rest of their lives.
This is the Russian world we live in. A world where a local clinic may be housed in a rundown building with rotting beams
and chipping paint.
You may encounter doctors with a non-existent bedside manner and endure lengthy waiting times.
However, there will undoubtedly be a fire alarm system, evacuation plans plastered on the walls,
and fire extinguishers and hydrants stocked all over the place.
True, In many ways, this is only an illusion of safety.
The fire exit may be locked, and the alarm buttons may be disabled to prevent children from tampering with them.
However, through this display, the government signals that it’s responsible for you and won't let you perish for nothing.
Observe the evacuation plan: everything is arranged correctly, and the fire safety officer’s name spelled in the corner
of the sheet, the one who’ll face jail time if things go south.
Imagine an old beater of a bus in a backwater town that’s barely spinning its wheels.
It always has an emergency window breaker.
Yeah, this bus hammer may be glued with an aviation sealant to prevent theft.
But by placing it there, the government says: we have inspected the bus, and we have taken responsibility
for your safety while aboard.
If something happens to you, there’ll be people held accountable.
You're not traveling to an unknown place with hell knows whom – everyone's identities are public.
In short, for at least the past 100 years, almost all governments, except for the truly disastrous ones,
have adhered to a simple principle: if someone dies tragically, it must be prosecuted.
Whether it's a plane, road, train, school, shopping mall, someone is always responsible
for a person's safety domestically.
There’s always a guy who signs the paperwork claiming that the amusement park ride has been inspected.
He may not have carried out the inspection, may have done a poor job, or may have been greased for his signature.
But he assumed responsibility.
Recall the tragedy at a large Siberian mall 5 years ago. Yes, there was some serious corruption implicated.
The mall’s construction used materials that would burn like firewood in gasoline.
But later, all the documents were collected, the responsible parties were identified, and they were brought to justice.
Because, in a corrupt state, shopping malls may be constructed with technological violations,
but a fire with human casualties carries legal repercussions.
After all, according to the documents, the building complied with all fire safety regulations.
Thus, those who signed off on them are criminals.
ACROSS THE ENLISTMENT OFFICE DIVIDE
In modern states, accidental deaths are never seen as normal. There’s always a culprit facing the charges.
Anyone born within the past 50 years has grown so accustomed to this natural state of affairs
that their brain can't readjust to anything different.
If you fall into an open sewer on your way to the military enlistment office, local media will cover the story,
social media will be abuzz, and the head of the local utility company will regret ever being born.
However, the moment you step through the door of that enlistment office, everything changes.
Because it’s not a door, it’s a gateway to an entirely different universe.
The war has been raging for nearly 14 months now.
We know how it’s been conducted. We know people are sent into brutal, meatgrinder-style assaults.
We've witnessed the terrifying bloodshed at Vuhledar, as well as the unthinkable 10-month-long battle
for Bakhmut with unimaginable human losses.
Countless lives are senselessly lost due to the incompetence and recklessness of those in command.
They treat people like they’re disposables, openly admitting to it.
This reality is so well-known that not only anti-war advocates and opposition channels discuss it,
but the information finds its way into mainstream Russian media.
Particularly when something truly horrible occurs, such as the New Year's Eve deaths of recruits from Samara
at a vocational school building in Makiivka, where personnel were housed alongside ammunition,
much to the delight of HIMARS operators.
Russian generals are being scolded, and their names are made public.
However, 400+ days into the hostilities, we’ve yet to see a single case
of any high-ranking officer being prosecuted or at least fired.
Sure, rumors are swirling about generals who have fallen from grace due to their failures and have been
removed from command.
But what does that mean for them? Perhaps just less stress and a lighter workload.
They'll continue to sit in their spacious offices, drive government cars, earn hefty salaries,
filch any loose cash they can get their hands on, and calmly await their honorary retirement in some cushy desk job.
Not a single case of people’s deaths, no matter how egregious or multiple, has been investigated.
Similarly, the mobilization of random, inexperienced people hasn't been investigated.
Sending fathers with many children and people with disabilities to the frontlines has seen everyone get away scot-free.
No matter the splash it makes or how many people witness the emotional pleas of those being sent
to fortifications without any training, scandals are being dealt with as follows:
the troublemakers are sent on another suicide mission from which they never make it alive.
Many people today don't take the new legislation canceling draft notices seriously,
mainly because they fail to fully comprehend the harsh reality of the situation,
where anything may happen to them and anything may be done to them.
People don't quite understand that the moment they step into a military enlistment office,
the government stops seeing them as human beings.
You can no longer file complaints, cite your civil rights, or contact the prosecutor's office.
It's impossible to hold anyone accountable for breaking rules because there are neither rules nor accountability anymore.
What sets the infamous "basements of the Donbas," where dissenters and draft dodgers are locked away,
apart from a real prison?
Terrible things can happen in a real prison; people can be tortured, assaulted, and even killed.
But all of these instances are crimes and breaches of rules.
With each new person tortured or killed, local authorities walk a tightrope because at some point,
other law enforcement agencies might want to use their exposure to their benefit.
They'll go after those authorities and put them behind bars.
But there are no constraints in a basement.
Anything can be done to you, and it won't be considered a violation since there's nothing to violate.
They can chop your head off and mark you up as MIA, and no one will ever find out the truth.
NEW NORMAL: PEOPLE AS A RESOURCE
I bet most of my viewers have never seen a dead body in their lives, except maybe at funerals.
A dead person on the street is a shocker.
First responders would immediately descend on the scene, and the area would be cordoned off.
Numerous officials and reporters would be swarming the place, and for an entire month,
the whole neighborhood would discuss the extraordinary event, even if it was just an accident at a construction site.
But Putin is waging a war where dead bodies simply become part of the scenery.
In the most intense battle zones, human remains are scattered everywhere, and no one bothers to remove them.
You may consider your life unique and irreplaceable, believing it can't be taken away that easily.
But you could end up in a place where wooded areas and trenches are layered with unique and irreplaceable lives,
with nobody caring about them. A corpse can't hold a gun and assault the enemy, so it's regarded as mere trash.
It's impossible for us to wrap our heads around this.
This is otherworldly imagery.
That’s why many people become so careless.
No matter how many times you tell them a story about Wagner mercenaries literally buying the recruits
and forcing them to sign a contract on pain of torture or murder, people still fail to fully comprehend it.
Because the reality of it is truly incomprehensible.
Someone assumes the responsibility for you and then sells you as a slave.
Telling such stories is easy, but it’s way harder to accept them.
In some poor countries, people don’t register newborns.
Because it’s still unclear whether the baby will survive,
and money spent on processing their papers won’t be compensated for.
We know such countries exist, and that it’s not just folklore.
But for those of us who grew up in a system that valued a child's life above all else,
we can't fathom a place where it's simply a financial matter.
Where a child's death isn't a tragedy but a financial risk to be mitigated.
Similarly, we struggle to believe in a world where people are just resources to be sent to their deaths, bartered for money,
or used to cover up mistakes. A world where someone can vanish without a trace and no one investigates it.
This dangerous delusion can send many people straight to military enlistment offices.
They may think that if they don't show up, they'll face problems like being deprived of their rights or charged criminally.
They assume they should go sort it out because the government won’t send them to die for no reason.
It will. And nobody will bat an eyelid. It's challenging to come to terms with this idea, but you just need to.
You need to realize that different worlds exist on either side of the military enlistment office door.
On the inside, your life is worthless.
The person who sends you to die won't face the consequences and won't even remember you existed.
I get it that it may be almost impossible to grasp.
I get that your instincts might tell you to try and play the game of red tape with the government,
give them the taste of their own medicine, which is complaints and mounting paperwork.
But these methods only work before you’ve walked through the enlistment office’s door.
Once you have, there’s nothing but death for you, death without a trace or consequence.
This may be a point of no return. There’s almost no escape from the mirror universe. No one will help you out there.
The only person who can help you is yourself. Don’t go there.
See you tomorrow!